Disclosed Exchanges Illustrate Jeffrey Epstein and Summers as Trusted Friends

Multiple messages between found guilty sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein and ex- US finance chief Larry Summers have emerged this week, revealing the pair acted as confidants.

These exchanges, spanning 2013 to early 2019, reveal the two men discussing private – and at times questionable – opinions on public affairs and personal connections.

I'm struggling to figure why [the] American elite feel if u kill your baby by violence and desertion it must be irrelevant to your acceptance to Harvard,”|“I’m trying to|I am attempting to|I'm struggling to} determine why [the] American elite believe if u kill your baby by beating and abandonment it must be unimportant to your entry to Harvard,”} Summers stated to Epstein in a 2017 message. Yet hit on a few women 10 years ago and can’t work at a network or think tank. DO NOT REPEAT THIS OBSERVATION.”

During that period, Harvard University was dealing with an enrollment discussion after a formerly incarcerated woman’s admission to a PhD program. Summers, a former president of the university who resigned amid a uproar after making sexist comments about female academics, went on to say in the email to Epstein: “I observed that half of the IQ in [the] world was owned by women without noting they are more than 51 percent of the populace.”

Summers was previously a prominent figure in Democratic circles – a one-time treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, one of the main designers of Barack Obama’s approach to the financial crisis, and a stalwart presence in the progressive media. But questions have lingered about his relationship with Epstein, a long-standing associate of Donald Trump. Epstein was alleged to have run a extensive sex trafficking of minors operation before his passing in custody in 2019 in New York City.

Following disclosure of a prior batch of emails between Epstein and Summers in a 2023 report, a representative for Summers stated that he “profoundly regrets being in contact with Epstein after his guilty verdict”.

Democratic lawmakers made public emails from the Epstein estate this week that suggest Epstein thought Trump was aware of conduct by the now-convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell. In reply, Republican lawmakers published a larger tranche of 20,000 emails from the Epstein estate.

The released materials show that Summers maintained amicable contact with the convicted child sex trafficker well into 2019, with the last email exchange happening only months before Epstein’s apprehension.

Trump wrote on Truth Social on Friday that he would be requesting the Department of Justice and the FBI to examine Epstein’s “participation and relationship” with Summers, among other prominent liberal leaders and corporate executives.

In the emails, Summers and Epstein discuss politics – notably Summers’s dislike for Trump – as well as the particulars of philanthropic social networking – and women. Summers, 70, shared with Epstein in a 2019 exchange about his overtures toward an unidentified woman, and being rebuffed.

“she is clever. ensuring you atone for previous missteps,” Epstein replied in an exchange on 16 March. “overlook the 'daddy' remark, I'm dating the motorcycle guy, you responded appropriately.. frustration signals affection., no protests revealed fortitude.”

Summers affirmed his regret in a recent statement. “I harbor significant regrets in my lifetime,” he said. “I’ve expressed this previously: my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein was a grave mistake.”

Summers was president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006. Epstein contributed more than $9m to Harvard and its affiliated programs between 1998 and 2008, and was appointed a visiting fellow to conduct research. The university later concluded Epstein “lacked the scholarly credentials visiting fellows normally possess and his application outlined a course of study Epstein was unqualified to pursue”.

Harvard only discontinued accepting Epstein’s donations after he confessed to child sex offenses in 2008.

By that time Obama’s star was rising. Summers would later secure appointment as director of the White House National Economic Council from January 2009 until November 2010.

After Summers left the White House, he began requesting Epstein for charitable advice for his wife, Elisa New, a Harvard professor pursuing a poetry project. Epstein and his foundations made gifts to projects associated with Summers’s wife, and the two men saw each other a multiple times between 2013 and 2016, often for dinner.

After news about Epstein’s donations surfaced, New’s charity made a donation “in excess” of that received to combatting sex trafficking organizations.